What Is Killing My Fish?!

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Welcome to MFK!

Sorry for your losses. I think your nitrate is extremely high and you aren't changing enough water weekly. I would suggest slowly upping the percentage of water you are changing weekly. Start with 25% ever 3rd day until your nitrate lowers and then you should be good at 40% to 50% weekly, depending on the stocking level of your tanks.

The only bubble I see on the fish is at the vent/anus area, is that correct? If so that is usually due to either water quality or constipation.

Can you provide more details on what you are feeding, if you are adding any buffers to the aquarium to adjust your tap water parameters, etc.?

Have you tested your tap water for nitrate, pH and carbonate hardness (KH) by letting it off gas for 24 hours?
Okay. So then tonight we will do a water change and Monday we will do another. The only conditioner we use right now is the topfin water conditioner as our normal is out of stock everywhere around us. Our tap water tests good. No issues there. When we make water for our water changes we test it before adding it to the tanks and everything is perfect. Currently we are feeding Xtreme Aquatic Foods cichlid pellets. They are really small. Peewee sized. Sinking. We also alternate with Hikari cichlid staple, size mini. And from time to time we do frozen brine.
 

Please take the advice of what D deeda has recommended for water changes.
 
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Please take the advice of what D deeda has recommended for water changes.
I am definitely going to change the way we do water changes. We have never had this problem in the past. Our tanks have been established for over a year. Not sure what has caused this change but I want to get it fixed.
 
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One other thing that I forgot to mention, not sure if it matters or not. My husband introduced new rocks into our tanks. He got them from a local fish store and we soaked them in hot hot water and then let them air dry away from anything before adding them to the tanks. That is really the only new thing in our tanks.

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I am definitely going to change the way we do water changes. We have never had this problem in the past. Our tanks have been established for over a year. Not sure what has caused this change but I want to get it fixed
Great to hear this sorry for the late reply. Most rocks sold in the lfs are normally aquarium safe so tbh don't know if the rocks caused any issues.
 
One other thing that I forgot to mention, not sure if it matters or not. My husband introduced new rocks into our tanks. He got them from a local fish store and we soaked them in hot hot water and then let them air dry away from anything before adding them to the tanks. That is really the only new thing in our tanks.

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if you seriously think that it could be an issue you can test whether the rocks are inert with i believe its baking soda (id just google the method). fish are exposed to just about every fish disease in the process of being transported through holding tank after holding tank. so when an aquarist makes a mistake the fish is weakened and diseases start popping up. so the disease is seldom to blame and it really comes down to something being wrong with the water.
 
I don't see an issue with some of the rocks though not sure which rocks you added.

Any chance you can post a couple of full tank pics? You do have some nice looking fish in the 4th or last pic!

Do you do any gravel vacuuming during a water change?

How about the frequency of filter cleaning?

I don't know if you do any online ordering but consider using Seachem Prime or Seachem Safe (powdered) as your water conditioner since you have a few aquariums. Either product will neutralize chlorine or chloramine in your tap water and won't add slime coat additives or other stuff not needed.

Are you still filling new water with buckets? If so, you may want to consider getting a Python water changer so you can fill directly from the faucet, assuming you have a faucet that would accept the faucet adapter. It's a real game changer to avoid lugging buckets of water around!
 
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